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The Episcopal Diocese of Lexington Living Together For Mission The Bishop’s Address to the 109th Convention of the Diocese of Lexington The Rt. Rev. Stacy F. Sauls February 18, 2005 |
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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Last year at about this
time I was asked by Bishop Phillip Duncan of the Diocese of the Central
Gulf Coast to preach at the opening Eucharist at his diocesan
convention. Knowing that we
were living in a highly charged atmosphere after General Convention, I
called Bishop Duncan, who had voted differently than I had on the issues
of homosexuality, to ask if he still wanted me to come.
I certainly did not want to cause more trouble for him than he
was already having to deal with, and I wanted to give him a graceful way
out. Unhesitatingly, he
asked me to come ahead. So I did. The convention was held in a town reassuringly named Niceville. I nevertheless arrived at the church for the opening Eucharist with some trepidation, but I had polite and pleasant conversations with the clergy and people who were gathering. The procession formed, and I prepared to enter the church. Just as the hymn was beginning, the outside door flew open and an older woman who was running late rushed in. She saw the procession and picked me out. She knew that I was the preacher. And she came right up to me, looked me in the eye, and asked, “Are you going to preach about that gay bishop in New Hampshire?” “No,” I said. “I’m going to preach about living together”—by which I meant, how we are all going to live together. But I could tell from the horrified look on her face that she had understood me to be about to preach about “living together” in an entirely different sense. So today, my friends, I want to talk to you about living together. I intend to speak with you frankly and forthrightly about the challenges we face. Some of what I have to say may be disturbing. All of it, I hope, will be challenging. And all of it is intended to get us back on track. We are now at a point in which the controversy around homosexuality has occupied an enormous amount of my time as your bishop, and a great deal of our time as a diocese. I pledge to you that I will do everything in my power to make that less the case. It is time that this issue cease to distract us from mission. We must not succumb to the ungodly forces of polarization. The situation is what it is, and either we can live with that or we can’t. Gene Robinson is the Bishop of New Hampshire. Some people are happy about that; others are not. “Do not be anxious,” Jesus said. Some people are happy with the results of our November election. Some are not. “Do not be anxious,” Jesus said. The Episcopal Church is strong enough to survive a gay bishop in New Hampshire no less than the United States is strong enough to survive whatever recent President you dislike the most, whether it is this one or the last one. Personally, I think the Anglican Communion, in which all the Episcopal Church has ever asked is the privilege to be able to give of our resources to others for the spread of God’s kingdom in the world, is strong enough to survive also. But if our international fellowship is not strong enough to survive one episcopal election in one small diocese, I have to ask myself, to tell you the truth, if it should. This brings me to something much more important than any particular issue. It is the nature of our church. I am an Episcopalian because my understanding of the Episcopal Church is that freedom of thought is not only accepted but valued, and debate is not only tolerated but encouraged. Both, I believe, are ultimately the best way to pursue the truth. The truth of the Gospel is not so fragile that it need fear a little honest debate, even a little conflict. Our fear of that is more a reflection on our faith than on anything else. “Do not be anxious,” Jesus said. Another reason that I am an Episcopalian is that a foundational principle of the English Reformation, of which we are the heir, is that decisions for the church in any particular country are best made by the people of that particular country in the manner in which they choose to make decisions. For Episcopalians that means the participation of bishops, clergy, and laity in an open and democratic process not unlike the one provided by the Founding Fathers for our American Republic. Our decisions are not made in a closed and autocratic system by which bishops only, and actually archbishops only, make decisions as princes of the church without any need for any input at all by those lower on the hierarchical ladder, which is how they are made in many parts of the Anglican Communion, particularly in Africa. As appealing as what some of those autocratic decisions might be to some of us right now, not one of us would appreciate the autocracy itself and I doubt that the autocracy would appreciate us not appreciating it. What we have to ask ourselves is if we are willing to surrender our Reformation heritage or our American experience of being church, all over one issue, that has never before been considered doctrinally essential and that will itself one day be replaced by another. My pledge to you is
to keep the Episcopal Church the broadly inclusive church that it has
always been. So long as I
can help it, the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Lexington will be
marked by freedom of thought and expression.
Just as we all wish to seek God in a church that allows us to
think for ourselves, so we must respect the right of others to do the
same. The nature of our new
humanity in Christ is not that we have to be right.
It is that we need each other to help correct our errors as we
seek God’s truth. It is
not necessary to have all the answers to all the questions.
It is only necessary to be seeking them.
The Episcopal Church, as long as I can help it, will be safe for
those who seek because it is in seeking, after all, that we find.
It is not necessary to agree with the bishop or anyone else to
belong here. It is
only necessary to seek. The greatest danger to our Anglican heritage that we face is not from those in error. It is from those who have no need to seek truth because they are content with the truth they think they already possess, as if truth is something subject to personal possession. It is from those who claim fidelity to the Bible but ignore the parts of it that do not suit them, like the part about not remarrying after divorce (Mt. 19:9; Mk. 10:12) or the part about how wrong it is for one part of the body to say to another part, “I have no need of you” (1 Cor. 12:21). It is from those who ignore the sacramental reality of Holy Baptism as a way of protecting the sacramental reality of Holy Matrimony. It is from those who would break their ordination vows and at the very same time claim their authority from that very same ordination. What we have to fear most as Anglicans at this point is not really so much heresy as it is hypocrisy. It is for this reason that throughout my episcopate I have insisted that in this Diocese we will be governed by the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Episcopal Church, including its constitution and canons. The reason is not that I am a lawyer, although that helps. It is that it is the best way to guard everyone’s integrity, liberal and conservative alike, the integrity of individuals and the integrity of the diocesan community. Since the first time I met with the clergy as their bishop, I have insisted that there will be no marriage of a same sex couple and no rite for the public blessing of a same sex union even though the latter is something I believe consistent with if not required by the Gospel. But I don’t get to decide on my own what the Gospel requires. That is something we do together. I took a vow, as all clergy have, to be governed by the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Episcopal Church, which do not permit those actions. There are some people in our Diocese who like that I am so governed in the case of same sex blessings, and others who do not. Nevertheless, my personal understanding must yield to the community’s understanding because it is through our ordered life in community that the Holy Spirit leads us, challenges us, and strengthens us. Similarly, a bishop, priest, or deacon of the Episcopal Church cannot claim the authority of his or her Episcopal ordination and at the same time denounce the Episcopal Church, abandon that church, and still seek to function in that church under the cover of a fictitious transfer to another part of the world, usually in Africa, to which the bishop, priest, or deacon has usually never been and clearly does not intend to go to be under the authority of a bishop they have never even met. Why? First, because there is no integrity for anyone in living in something that is a falsehood contrived solely for the purpose of avoiding responsibility and accountability. Second, because all clergy have taken a vow to be governed by the doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Episcopal Church, which do not permit those actions. For that reason, I have inhibited four clergy from exercising their ministries just as surely as I would discipline a priest who purported to marry two persons of the same sex. I cannot enforce the canons with respect to one thing without enforcing them with respect to the other thing. I cannot ignore the discipline of the church with respect to some things without ignoring it with respect to all things. My integrity as your bishop depends on my consistency. I would much rather be confident in my integrity than free of criticism by those who refuse to live by their vows. I believe our community integrity depends on exactly the same principle. We must do what we have all promised to do and be accountable to each other to do so. Now I’m getting to one of those very frank parts in this address. I sincerely regret that anyone was hurt or stumbled or felt betrayed by the actions of General Convention and I will do anything I can to make it right and to work with all my strength for reconciliation because reconciliation is the heart of the Gospel. At the same time I want you to know this. I am tired of apologizing for the General Convention of 2003. You will not hear me do it again. I will acknowledge that it is possible that we did the wrong thing. What I know for a fact is that, to the extent anyone made a mistake, no one did so with any intent other than being a faithful follower of Christ, and I do not believe that even God asks more than that. And if God asks no more than that, we have no right to do so on God’s behalf. I am talking to you
about what I believe in my heart. What
I believe we did is take a profound step forward toward God’s
perspective on humanity, a perspective in which all persons regardless
of the artificial differences between them are welcome and included both
in the kingdom of God and consequently in the community of God’s
people on earth, the church. I
believe that is what St. Paul meant when he said: “As many of you as
were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.
There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or
free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in
Christ Jesus. And if you
belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to
the promise” (Gal. 3:27-29). I
believe that is what St. Peter meant when he said, “I truly understand
that God shows no partiality” (Acts 10:34), which is something he said
at the very time he was violating the law of Moses by entering the home
of Cornelius the centurion to proclaim the Good News to those who had
been excluded from fellowship by the law.
Please understand what I am saying.
I am not asking for anyone else to agree with me, and I never
will. I am not asking
anyone to believe what I believe, and I never will.
I am asking all of us to make room for those who disagree with
whatever we think. I would
never, ever force anyone to agree with me about this or anything else,
even if I had the power to do so, which I do not.
I would never, ever force a congregation of this diocese to have
a gay priest or to bless a same sex relationships, even if I had the
power to do so, which I do not. In
fact, the canons, which I insist that we live by, protect us all from
such abuses. Those of you
who oppose gay clergy and the pastoral support of same sex relationships
deserve that the rest of us to respect your position and honor you as
our own family, which you are. As
long as I am bishop, that will be the case. But those of you who oppose gay clergy and the pastoral
support of same sex relationships must do likewise.
You must respect those of us who disagree and honor us as your
own family simply because that is what we are.
For that, whether we like it or not, is what God has made us in
Christ through Holy Baptism.
Just as you may not be forced to act as others would, so you may
not force others to act as you would.
“In everything do to others as you would have them do to you;
for this is the law and the prophets” (Mt. 7:12). I am making a simple
proposal. Dearest people of
God, we have work to do. Let
us get on with it. Keep
talking to each other. Keep
arguing with each other. That
is what Anglicans do. But
stop trying to hurt each other. That
is not what Christians do.
The truth is that this controversy is not about the Bible. To be sure, we have a legitimate difference of opinion about
what the Bible says, but the Bible cannot honestly be used as an excuse
for Christians to divide themselves from one another. That is about the most unbiblical thing I have ever heard
of. Nor is theology the issue.
If theology were the issue, might it not deserve just the
slightest mention that the Archbishop of Canterbury has himself ordained
gay men to the priesthood and advocated for supporting same sex
relationships and approved the appointment of a gay man to be a Bishop
in the Church of England? If
theology were the issue, might it not be worth mentioning that the
official position of the English House of Bishops for almost 5 years has
been in support of formally blessing same sex relationships even if it
has been not in favor of ordaining people in such relationship?
If theology were the issue might not African Churches be
threatening to break communion with the Church of England?
If theology were the issue, might we not occasionally mention
that the American House of Bishops Theology Committee Report finds that
there are sound, rational, and faithfully advanced arguments on both
sides of the issue? Theology
is not the issue, either.
Nor is the Anglican Communion the issue.
The truth is that most of the people in our pews don’t even
know their own bishop’s name, let alone the Archbishop of Canterbury’s.
It is difficult for me to believe that American Episcopalians
think that their church issues should be decided by bishops sitting in
London or Lagos or Kampala or Singapore or anywhere overseas any more
than they think their national security should be decided by the United
Nations. The Anglican
Communion is also not the issue.
The issue of living together is not the Bible.
It is not theology. It
is not the Anglican Communion. It
is maturity. Mature people
can stay in relationship with those who disagree with them, neither
yielding their own opinions nor requiring others to do so.
Mature people do not make conformity a condition of love.
A healthy and mature family can stay together despite difference
and even conflict and stress. The
same is so in a healthy and mature church. Maturity is not to be
found only on one side of our current debate or the other.
We in this room are by no means in agreement. Yet we are here together.
That is maturity. Calvary
Church in Ashland is an example. The
people of Calvary largely, but not entirely, disagree strongly with me
about sexuality, but they are also mature people.
They stay in relationship despite disagreement because that is
what mature people do, especially when they have mature leadership. I have visited Calvary twice since General Convention.
Never once has anyone treated me in any way but graciously.
They did not stay away from communion when I presided. They held
the traditional pot luck dinner. And
when I told them that their opinion mattered to me, even if I disagreed,
and that the disagreement in no way lessened my affection for them, they
applauded—right there in the church.
There is disagreement at St. Andrew’s, Ft. Thomas.
It has never occurred to the people of St. Andrew’s not to be
in communion with their bishop and the rest of their brothers and
sisters, even if they do disagree with me.
Again, they are mature people with mature leadership.
But my favorite story in this regard is little Christ Church in
Harlan. Now the people of
Harlan were pretty mightily upset after General Convention.
In fact, they were so upset that I didn’t think we would be
able to bring about reconciliation without bringing in a bishop from
outside. So I wrote a
letter to the Christ Church leadership last December and suggested that
I might send another bishop and gave them three suggestions to choose
from. Their rector and a
representative of their lay leadership came to see me.
They let it be known that they were none too happy with me, but
after all, I was their bishop and they didn’t see any need for another
one. Surely one bishop is
all anyone ought to have to endure.
Again, it is the maturity of the leadership that has made the
difference. Spiritual maturity is the
only antidote to schism, and not only that, it is the best and perhaps
only way to pursue the truth, which is the only antidote to heresy.
Truth, for Anglicans, is a relational issue.
It is not an individual issue.
That is why it requires maturity.
Truth cannot be found independently of one another.
Truth, for Anglicans, grows out of relationship, out of being in
community with others, not out of being imposed from the top down. Anglicans read the Bible together, which leads invariably to
Anglicans arguing about the Bible together. Starting today I am
proposing a new mission strategy for the Diocese of Lexington.
It is based on a parable that Jesus told. “Someone
gave a great dinner and invited many.
At the time for the dinner he sent his slave to say to those who
had been invited, ‘Come; for everything is ready now.’ But they all alike began to make excuses.
The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land, and I
must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.’
Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going
to try them out; please accept my regrets.’
Another said, ‘I have just been married, and therefore I cannot
come.’ So the slave
returned and reported this to his master.
The owner of the house became angry and said to his slave, ‘Go
out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the
poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’
And the slave said, ‘Sir, what you ordered has been done, and
there is still room.’ Then
the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the roads and lanes, and
compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled’” (Lk.
14:16-23). Listen carefully to the story. Those who had originally been invited by the host came up with one excuse after another—the details of a land purchase, trying out the new oxen, a new wife. The master got angry. But at whom was he angry? We are conditioned to hear the master’s anger as directed to the guests that turned down the invitation. Indeed, that is how a similar story is told in Matthew, chapter 22, where the host is a king who destroys the town in a rage in response to being slighted by the intended guests. Not so in Luke. In Luke the host does not take the initial response to the invitation as a rejection because of which he gets angry. Instead, he chooses something much more creative. Instead of getting mad at those who declined, he invites others. In Luke’s version of the story, I think the host gets mad instead at his servant. Of course, the slave can’t help it that the originally invited guests made their excuses. What the slave can help is what he does in response to the list of excuses. The master is angry about the slave’s lack of imagination to fill up the master’s house with new guests. What the master wants to know is why the slave hasn’t already rounded up the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame. And when there is still room what the master wants to know is why the slave has not gone out into the streets and alleys and compelled people to come in. The master will not take no for an answer. What makes the master angry, I think, is the slave’s willingness to take no for an answer. It was the slave’s assignment to fill up the house, which he had failed to do. My dear friends, in this story, we are the slave. It is up to us to fill up God’s house, including the room left by those who have refused, for whatever excuse they might have had, to come to the great dinner party. That will be my policy as your bishop. If those invited first will not come, the task before us as God’s servants is to fill God’s house with other guests. The task before us is to live out the Parable of the Great Dinner.
A month ago the people of the Church of the Apostles refused our
invitation to stay at God’s table with us.
We extended the invitation to them by offering to let them choose
another bishop to oversee them. We
extended the invitation to them by offering to let them completely
redirect their diocesan assessment without filing an appeal.
We extended the invitation to them by offering to let them use
the church property, the title to which is held by the Diocese, without
interference by the Diocese or me through a 99-year lease for $1 per
year so long as they stayed in the Episcopal Church and for an amount
equal to what their fair share giving would have been in the event they
chose to leave the Episcopal Church.
It was the most creative invitation I could think of to extend.
But it was not enough. For
whatever reasons, they would not come to God’s table with us.
What the Parable of the Great Dinner has done for me is help me
to realize that from God’s perspective, the reason doesn’t really
matter. That is between God
and them. What is between
God and me, and between God and us, is what we do about the empty places
in God’s house. So we
applied some creativity to find new guests.
I’m very happy to say that there has never been a Sunday that
the former home of the Church of the Apostles has not been used for an
Episcopal Eucharist. On the
first Sunday we gathered a congregation of volunteers from Lexington
parishes so that we could continue to hold the Holy Eucharist in that
location. Jesus, after all,
had never left, which was symbolized by the fact that the former members
of Apostles, their priest, and their deacon left the consecrated body
and blood of Christ behind in the chapel aumbry.
But beginning the next Sunday, an entirely new congregation began
to gather, not just any congregation, but a congregation of young
adults, mostly in their 20s. When I first met with them there were 14.
The next Sunday, about 25; then, 30.
Now there are about 45 all together.
They have filed a petition to be organized as a mission.
They have collected pledges.
They had a banner in last night’s procession and helped host
last night’s reception. Taking
their inspiration from the baptismal covenant they have formulated a
mission statement, to strive for justice and peace among all people and
respect the dignity of every human being, by which they mean every
human being. They are
seated at this diocesan convention for the very first time as All Saints
Episcopal Church of Lexington. I
hope you will join me in welcoming them to this diocesan family.
Our newest congregation, All Saints, reminds us that we have some
very good news to share, which is, after all, what the word evangelical
means. And truly good news
is something this world we live in desperately needs.
The world is divided by polarizing differences of opinion.
We have a message of spiritual maturity, that ours is a community
that transcends differences of opinion, a community in which love is the
test of doctrine, a community in which the one and only necessity for
the door to be opened is to knock. We have an invitation to announce. Not for our own benefit.
Not necessarily to make the church grow. And certainly, God forbid, not to help pay the bills.
We have an invitation to those who cannot return the favor to
share our resources with those who have less, to reach out to those who
are not normally seen or heard. This
is the good news. God
has made room even for us, which makes it incumbent on us to make more
room still. We are here to
proclaim our Great Dinner mission strategy—The Episcopal Church
welcomes you. So,
whatever our opinion on how best to love homosexual persons, which in
truth is the only thing we have a serious disagreement about, let us be
about what Jesus told us to be about—the task of
welcoming God’s people, all of them, the task of radical
hospitality. To that end, I am asking the Evangelism Commission to take
the Parable of the Great Dinner as its inspiration. We will remember the
parable Jesus told in Luke chapter 14 that God’s house is to be filled
with guests, the unexpected guests, the poor and crippled and outcast,
the ones no one ever thought they would want to sit down at table with. I respect that that may make all of us mildly uncomfortable,
but if you think it isn’t scriptural, you need to go back and look
again. Later this year the Episcopal Church will embark on a national advertising campaign. We have received a small grant from the church to help us participate, but frankly, if we are to make the most of this opportunity, we are going to need more money. The purpose is to invite the poor, the crippled, and the unwanted starting now. Look at what St. Andrew’s in Lexington is already doing. They’ve been inviting refugees from the violence of the Congo and Liberia to come to God’s table. And more of them come every week. A church that had nearly died off six years ago is now full of children and life and activity. They are getting close to being full on Sunday mornings and for the first time in many, many years they are having to plan for a Sunday School and youth group. It is amazing how human beings, regardless of nationality, regardless of anything that might separate them, respond to invitation, like that the people of St. Andrew’s have extended. And
that is what is happening at St. John’s, Versailles, too, in addition
to the new All Saints. There
is new life at St. John’s and there are new people at St. John’s,
people who once would not have been welcome there unless they found it
welcoming to hear what an abomination they were week after week.
And the most obvious thing is that there is new joy in the life
of St. John’s that was not there before.
It is amazing what happens when grace begins to reign.
So the first task of the Evangelism Commission is to prepare us
to welcome others and to prepare us to fill the master’s dinner party
with unexpected guests. The second task will be to develop a sound strategy with faith-filled and very specific goals. We badly need a church to respond to the rapid growth around Hamburg Plaza in Lexington. I am asking us to plan a church for that area of Lexington. Our lack of attention to the fastest growing part of our diocese, Northern Kentucky, is shameful. We need to pay immediate attention to that area. The clergy of Northern Kentucky have already started paying attention. And we must not forget our commitment to the Church of Our Saviour in Madison County. They have been struggling for years to build a church. Together we can help. So, I will be asking you very shortly to join me in a building project by which our sweat equity is invested in a church raising that will permit Our Saviour to grow without the burden of excessive debt. We may lack the money to get it done. We do not lack the will to get it done. We must not fail to take note of the rural areas that make up a great deal of our diocese. I will be asking the Evangelism Commission to consult with other primarily rural dioceses about how to best serve the hardest to reach and more isolated areas of our Diocese and to develop not only an appropriate urban strategy but an appropriate rural strategy as well. We will have to find new models to do so. We must think in new ways about how to extend the message of love and grace and acceptance, the message of good news to the poor, recovery of sight to the blind, release to the captives, and the acceptable year of the Lord in the hardest to reach parts of our diocese. And finally we must concentrate on reaching out especially to underserved and neglected groups to find some of our unexpected guests. Over 10% of the population of Fayette County speaks Spanish. The situation is similar throughout our half of Kentucky. We have got to reach out to bring our Latino brothers and sisters into the great dinner that God has prepared for us and for them. By this summer we will have three Spanish-speaking clergy. So, I propose that we make grants of $10,000 each to the churches of these three clergy to begin Hispanic ministry outreach in their communities this year—not next year—this year. We must
also go to the college campuses to welcome young people, people for whom
the old ways of doing church have lost much of their meaning, and
especially young people who, for the first time are asking themselves if
the life of the mind and the life of faith can be consistent.
We can no longer wait. We
must do something about this now. And
we must provide the resources for this to allow it to begin happening
this year—not next year—this year.
To do that work, we need resources.
And it is my job to be actively seeking them—from you. We are not going to let the current controversies in the Episcopal Church distract us from our mission. It is way past time that we stopped being distracted by homosexuality, heterosexuality, or any sexuality. Enough already! You would think we were all in high school. Is anyone else out there tired of talking about this issue year after year? The one and only issue that we are going to concentrate on is how best to love the people God has given us to love. Could we please, please, please, God, find something else to talk about? Could it possibly be mission? I cannot conclude my annual report to you without mentioning several significant advances in mission that have occurred in the last year and that hold great promise for the future. Since I first came here, now almost five years ago, I have longed to rebuild two diocesan missions, one at St. Paul’s in Newport, the other at St. Timothy’s on Barnes Mountain. My dream is that St. Paul’s will become a model for urban mission and that St. Timothy’s will be come a model for rural mission. However distracted we may have been by controversy or national church politics or meetings of the Lambeth Commission, we have taken major steps forward at St. Paul’s and St. Timothy’s. We have brought in Matthew Young, a priest with redevelopment skills, to lead St. Paul’s and his work is already showing results. He has been called in a partnership between St. Paul’s and the rest of the Diocese to share the expense of this redevelopment. We have been able to make Bryant Kibler a full-time member of the diocesan staff to lead our work at Barnes Mountain. You have already heard him report on progress at St. Timothy’s. Reading Camp, of course, continues to be a key element in our strategy to reach people with the good news of God’s all-embracing love. There were three new camps this past summer, serving a total of 113 campers. In 2005, there will be another camp, making a total of five, the newest one to be held at Mission House, the first in the Lexington area. I firmly hope that we will continue to expand reading camp in Northern Kentucky, Morehead, Prestonsburg, Barnes Mountain, and in the River Park neighborhood of Lexington. The only thing needed is willing hands and, more importantly, hearts. This coming summer the Diocese of Lexington will host the Episcopal Youth Event, a once every three year event gathering high school age young people from all over the Episcopal Church, throughout the United States as well as our overseas dioceses in Latin America, Taiwan, and Haiti. It will be our honor to extend hospitality to the energy and enthusiasm of these young people. The theme of our convention, of course, involves reaching out beyond ourselves, particularly to our companion diocese in Haiti, which is the largest diocese in the Episcopal Church, the fastest growing diocese in the Episcopal Church, and the poorest diocese in the Episcopal Church. We have a dedicated Companion Diocese Committee, and they will be diligently looking for ways to deepen our relationship with the people of Haiti. We will commit significant diocesan resources to that end, over $10,000 this year in addition to $40,000 last year through our assessment redirection policy. As soon as the political climate stabilizes and it is once again safe to travel to Haiti, I hope we will send the first mission team to begin work at the Episcopal University of Haiti where our friend Bishop Duracin has asked us to work. The people of Haiti may be the best reason I can possibly think of to stop letting ourselves be distracted by issues of sexuality. Haiti cannot afford it. The world we serve cannot afford it. The people of Kentucky cannot afford. And we cannot afford it. The final thing I want to say is a word of thanks. There are so many people who need to be thanked, but as bishop, I especially want to turn my attention to the men and women of my staff. Frankly, you have no idea how hard they work on your behalf and sometimes how much grief they take on your behalf. We simply could not do it without them. I want to recognize them and ask them to stand: Johnnie Ross, Maggie Hall, Andy Sigmon, Bryant Kibler, Kay Collier McLaughlin, Cindy Sigmon, Karma Cassidy, Donna Barr, Ellen Darnall, Matt Hartney, and Andy Sauls. I am deeply grateful for your dedication and your loyalty. Actually, there is one more thing. You. You are the Diocese of Lexington, not me. You are the community that represents the all-inclusive love of Christ in the eastern half of Kentucky that we call the Diocese of Lexington. You are the reason that despite a very, very difficult year to be a bishop in the Episcopal Church, I have loved every day of my ministry with you—well, almost every day. One of my colleagues, who was recovering from surgery, was told by a communicant that he had noted that the bishop had survived the surgery but that he was more hopeful about the result next time. Or there was another bishop who was told by a parish warden that the warden’s priest had advised him to wash his hands thoroughly after shaking hands with the bishop. We are dealing with issues of maturity. This is another place where I will speak to you frankly. The truth is that there have been some dark days for my family and me in the last 18 months. The viciousness of website attacks, slander, personal demonization, and utter fabrications have not gone unnoticed, although they have been more hurtful to my wife and sons than to me. For me the things that people say in the cowardly safety of anonymity are valued in exact proportion to the courage they so noticeably lack. And the issue, I realize, is not righteousness. It is maturity. For myself, if some suffering is part of doing the right thing as best I see it, of fulfilling my vow to help those who have no other helper, well then, I must count it as God’s grace to share in Christ’s suffering in which we are promised that we will also share in his risen life. I will one day have to give an account before God of my stewardship of this Diocese. I will ask God’s forgiveness for my failure to keep all of God’s children together. On that day, I will stand before God, probably a little afraid, but also with confidence in the blood of Christ poured out in love for me beside which all my shortcomings and failures will be insignificant. I will not be confident in my rightness on issues of homosexuality or anything else, but I will be confident in God’s mercy and compassion. And I will be confident that, in spite of my failures, I tried my best. Deep in my heart, I believe in a God that asks nothing more. And I know that I will be confident that, through it all, I loved you, the people of the Diocese of Lexington, my dearest brothers and sisters. And my heart will be filled with thankfulness for you all, that God working in you has drawn me closer to Godself in Jesus God’s son. I do not know what paths the coming year might hold, and it is possible that some of them may be pretty strange and unexpected. I do know that I want to thank you for allowing me to be your bishop, in what the official documents call the fifth year of my consecration, but in what I prefer to call the fifth year of my love for the people of the Diocese of Lexington. Thank you all very much.
The Rt. Rev. Stacy F. Sauls Bishop of Lexington
Posted February 18, 2005
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